Volleyball: Snowbirds pull away in fifth game

October 01, 2010|By Jeremy Speer Sports Editor

GAYLORD — The St. Mary volleyball team has showed marked improvement throughout this season. That was evident in last week’s win against Mancelona and again showed Tuesday, with a thrilling five-game victory against Bellaire.

In the fifth and deciding game, the Snowbirds were clearly having fun, benefiting from solid serving and strong net play. It wasn’t even close, with the home team winning, 15-5.

“We knew we had to have a quick start and we did because our serving was improved from the fourth game,” said St. Mary coach Randy Schmidlin. “We had consistent serving for the most part, and we had four or five girls really hitting the ball hard. It was a lot of fun — the girls play better in front of the home crowd.”

It was a battle throughout the night between the much-improved Bellaire squad and the Snowbirds, who improved to 2-4 in Ski Valley Conference play.

The Eagles came out strong in the first game and despite some late serving heroics by Emily Butcher and good hitting by Stephanie LaRouche, Bellaire cruised, 25-16.

It was a different Snowbirds team that came out in the second game, starting from the opening point, where senior Jillian Schmidlin threw down an emphatic kill. Schmidlin was excellent throughout the game, recording three kills and an ace. Junior Ellyn Milan also added four kills, while senior Kaitlyn Broz and junior Katie LeBlanc each added an ace in a kill in St. Mary’s 25-18 win.

Game three featured some outstanding volleys by both teams and after St. Mary built a huge lead, Bellaire came back to take a 24-23 lead. But LeBlanc saved the day with a kill on match point, before she and Broz helped give the team a 25-24 lead. In the deciding point, Broz bumped the ball over the net for the win.

In that game, Schmidlin had three kills and an ace, while LaRouche and LeBlanc each had a pair of kills.

Bellaire took advantage of poor Snowbird serving in the fourth game and won easily, 25-15. Milan had two kills to lead St. Mary in that game.

The serving of freshman Caylee Lawnichak proved to be the difference in the fifth game, as she served up the final eight points to allow the Snowbirds to easily roll. Milan’s strong hitting accounted for the final two points of the match.

“We didn’t play as well as we did against Mancelona, but we’re getting better,” Randy Schmidlin said.

Milan (12 kills) and Jillian Schmidlin (eight) were again leaders in the hitting department, with LeBlanc (seven), LaRouche (five), Broz (four), Butcher (two) and Emily Reppuhn (two) contributing also. Broz was solid as the team’s main setter, and was 17-of-17 serving, while coach Schmidlin moved Butcher, also a strong setter, to the other side of the formation. Butcher’s strong play helped the Snowbirds generate an attack from both sides of the court.

Schmidlin was 14-of-14 on serve receipts, while other defensive leaders were Butcher, LeBlanc and Maggie Cosgrove. Lawnichak was a perfect 17-of-17 serving.